Kickin' Family Fun

We've been trying to get Caelyn involved in anything for years now. She just doesn't want to join any clubs or sports. I finally told her she had to do something, so she chose karate. I thought that might be a good thing to enroll Wyatt in also as a structured setting.

Last weekend, we all went to see what it was like. On the way there, Piper said she wanted to do it. She also does dance and really wanted to do gymnastics. I told her she had to pick between gymnastics and karate because I want her to continue with dance. She's really good! She chose karate.

When we got there, the two instructors took Caelyn, Piper and Wyatt onto the mat and began some basic moves with them. Turns out Wyatt's not ready for structured lessons. He's still a free spirit. So we watched as Caelyn and Piper did punches, kicked a bag and broke boards with their feet. Okay, so it wasn't a two by four, but they thought it was pretty cool.

We decided to sign them up. Hey, they get points for listening to their parents, using manners, helping out. Of course I'm gonna sign them up. Even better, under the family plan, because we signed the two of them up, the rest of us are free!! We have our first family private lesson on Saturday. Thank goodness there aren't any cameras in there! :D While we were filling the paperwork out, we were in this little room that had one of the bags for kicking. I looked over and Larkin's kicking it with her foot. So not only is she going to dance, she's going to take karate when she's old enough, too!

I'll let y'all know how Saturday went. Oh, and we can go up to four times a week, no extra cost. So on days the kids are saying they're bored, I'll pop em in the car and make em kick out their boredom!

Who Does He Think He Is?

Jason really wanted to go to King's Island in Cincinnati over the weekend, but I convinced him the Indy Zoo would be just as much fun. And he believed me! Sunday morning we got the kids up and in the car and headed downtown. Caelyn thought maybe we were headed to the race (Indy 500). These kids don't like spending five minutes in the car and she thinks we're taking them to watch cars go around a track for five HOURS? We got to the zoo early enough that we could catch the first dolphin show. I don't think we've seen the show since before Wyatt was born, so the kids really enjoyed it. Larkin was just dancing along with the music.

The Indianapolis Zoo is a very nice zoo. They've done a ton of upgrades and new exhibits. This summer they have a couple of koalas visiting. One of the new things that opened last year is a shark petting pool. We hadn't seen that yet, so we headed over to the Oceans exhibit. After finally pushing (not really, we're patient people) our way to the edge of the pool, we watched the sharks swimming by and occasionally ran fingers down their backs. Jason and Piper were at the other end of the pool and Jason mentioned we needed to see a particular shark. We walked over to the other side of the pool to the shark resting area, where you're not allowed to pet them. Several sharks over there visited with us, but it was obvious which shark Jason wanted me to see.

Maybe he thinks the dolphins get too much attention. Or maybe he's confused on his species. Either way, he's an attention getter. The video is not too long, but all the good stuff is at the end. And just so Jason didn't have a terrible time, I let him take the older kids on the roller coaster.

An Early Celebration

Next weekend, we are headed up to IL for the joint birthday party of Grant, Wyatt and Ryan. We're gonna do that on Saturday and on Sunday, we're doing the Autism Walk at Soldier Field in Chicago. Wyatt, Larkin, Kristi, Drew and I did it last year, but this year, I think I'm getting the whole family involved.

So, because we're going to be gone that weekend (Saturday is Wyatt's birthday) we decided to open the presents Grandpa O brought up this week today. Wouldn't want them to get lost in the barrage of gifts next weekend. Or for the Benson boys to get jealous of what he might get. Wyatt had fun opening all the presents. He got a Thomas book with sounds (thanks, Mom!), he got a coloring book with crayons and markers, a tin with "Cars" magnets and his favorite, a Lightning McQueen remote controlled car.

Hopefully this works:

Be Careful What You Wish For

I decided that over the summer, I was going to start Wyatt on potty training. Except he beat me to it. Last Wednesday, as soon as he got to school, he took off his diaper and threw it in the garbage. His teacher called to tell me about it and suggested that I just send him in underpants from now on and we'll see how it goes. So far, so good. He loves to go! Unfortunately, it's every two minutes! I think his favorite thing is the Thomas and McQueen underwear. We've had it since last summer and it's just been waiting for him to be ready. I guess he's ready. He's only had one accident since we started the undies on Monday. I still have him in diapers overnight, but as soon as he wakes up, he yanks em off and sits on the toilet. Not bad for a kid who was afraid of the toilet a couple of months ago. Of course, that's because he lost his grip and his bottom fell into the water.....

I was going to get a picture of him on the potty and post it, but don't want to embarrass the poor kid. Hopefully we'll be done with diapers soon, but I've heard boys take a long time to train. The only experience I've had is with Jason and it's taken 12 years to get where we are. :D